Leave A Comment

Awesome Con falls way short of cosplay world record

Although an attempt on Friday to set an new world record for the largest gathering of people dressed as comic book characters fell considerably short — 1,294 people short to be exact — it did manage to attract a lot of media coverage for Washington, D.C.’s Awesome Con.

According to WUSA Channel 9, just 237 cosplayers rallied at the U.S. Capitol Reflecting Pool, leaving intact the record of 1,530 people set in April 2011 in China.

Of course, it was a Friday afternoon, likely cutting down on the number of people who could participate, and Guinness World Records has some pretty strict criteria. As we pointed out on Friday, the list of approved characters is made up almost entirely of Marvel and DC Comics properties; as CBS DC notes, 201 participants were excluded from the 2011 effort in China because they were dressed as characters from video games, television shows and other media.

Still, drawing more than 200 people in costume to the National Mall on a weekday afternoon is a pretty impressive feat, particularly for a convention only in its second year. Plus, there’s always next year, right? Maybe, Awesome Con founder Ben Penrod told DCist: “I’ll have to think about it.”